Watching the bats take off each
evening
on the Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin,
Texas has become
quite a tourist attraction.
The Country Bat and the City Bat
Caves aren't the only place that bats "hang out". Bats also sleep in trees, mines, under bridges, in bushes and even in old buildings or barns. Some tiny South American bats make tent-like shelters out of palm tree leaves.
Bats that might have typically lived in caves have begun to adapt to urban life by modifying their behavior to live in man made structures in the city. The largest urban bat colony is under the Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin, Texas. The bridge is home to about 1.5 million Mexican free-tail bats. To put that in perspective, Austin is home to only a little over 1.5 million people -- there are nearly as many bats living under the bridge as there people living in the entire city!